Thanks to Richard Schauer for sending along another update of the rapid progress on CTA trolley bus 9631, which is at a contractor in Elgin being repainted. This is an exciting, nearly turn-key project that was made possible by a generous donor. Do you have a bus at the museum you'd like to see painted, and some spare cash you'd rather see go to IRM than IRS? Drop us a line!
I stopped by the shop early this week because of the holiday. Their business had lightened up a bit this week and they were actively working on 9631 when I was there. I got another couple (good) pictures of the curb side finished, and another of today's main project- the rear curb-side upper corner. As expected, it was pretty bad. The guy doing the work said that when he dug the Bondo out, there was a large gouge in it, where you see the fresh weld in the picture.
The back door is ready to reassemble; they did a bit of welding on its frame to fix some broken welds. Maybe now it will close easier?
Bill Wulfert found us some genuine new-old-stock CTA heralds for the sides. These are dated July 1972. Don't worry about the adhesive- we put four of these on the 2000-series rapid transit cars that we repainted five years ago, and they are still stuck very well.
2 comments:
"Do you have a bus at the museum you'd like to see painted, and some spare cash you'd rather see go to IRM than IRS?"
-Makes a "Bee Line" towards the bus I'd like to see painted in the future.
-Matt Maloy
Matt- Thanks for the sentiment toward the Bee Line 512. I too would like to see it spruced up in the future. I'd probably vote for putting it back to Indian Trails, but in its current "Battle of Britain" paint scheme that it got during WWII. I'm not saying Bee Line was a two-bit outfit or anything, but having the company name on the side in stencil letters like a can of generic beans detracts from its appearance in my opinion!
R. W. Schauer
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